


...of my enemy

by tarshaan



Category: The X-Files
Genre: Gen, Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-30
Updated: 2014-08-30
Packaged: 2018-02-23 15:02:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 560
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2551877
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tarshaan/pseuds/tarshaan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>poetry. musing.</p>
            </blockquote>





	...of my enemy

**Author's Note:**

> originally written some years ago for the dictionary lyric wheel, and inspired by the word:
> 
> quidam (n / pronoun): somebody; unknown person. a certain person or thing (known but not necessarily named). Also used occasionally in phrases in the sense of 'a kind of' or 'so to speak.'

They talk as if it were new, as if  
no one had ever stood against the world  
and held  
as if you were the first  
the only  
the enemy  
                (you're not)  
but that's why you're still alive,  
 _tovarisch_

the old men in their smoking towers  
they can't control you and they can't distract you and  
still yet they cannot kill you   
and so you're  
the enemy  
                (you're the thorn in their side. You're the one who knows too much and too little, the one  
                that is neither this nor that, up nor down, south nor west. You're the one who'll fight in the  
                shadows but walk in the light, who'll take the bait and follow it past the hand that laid it, walk  
                to where the path runs out and still refuse to stop)  
but that's why you're still alive,  
 _tovarisch_

so when tomorrow the ruin of their plans  
sends fumes throughout their fortress  
they'll look to you   
they'll see you: you  
the enemy  
                (stumbling into the dark and traipsing blithely through the tattered leavings of every failed  
                experiment you shouldn't in a thousand years of hunting find—you're the X-File you hunt, Mulder.)  
And that is why you're still alive,  
 _moy drug_

Because there is a weapon to use against them  
and there is a way to keep them gone  
Because you're the one they most want  
dead  
and you're the one they most want  
vanquished  
and you're the one still  
here. You're  
the enemy  
                (you're a tool  
to turn in my grasp and  
bite the hand that feeds me)  
the enemy  
                (a distraction  
to take their attention and detour their plotting)  
the enemy  
                (of my enemies—  
does that make you  
my friend?)

and laughter scalds  
bounced from shadows  
and mirth injures  
when loosed from shackles  
and still they think you're  
the enemy  
                (as if! I've met the enemy. I've walked beside them and fought beside them, done their bidding  
                and cleansed their messes, all the while shadow-boxing behind their notice, beneath their care.  
                And unlike you, they never suspected  
                a thing)  
So they'll smile  
and they'll welcome me aboard  
and they'll watch the screens they'll  
track you on as once again you're here  
when everyone could swear you were there  
and they'll not look inside this arm  
— the hollow one you gifted me —  
and they'll never see their  
death  
in vials  
iridescent in the night  
while they watch your personal ray of sunshine  
bringing light to all they've hidden so long in darkness  
and they'll talk  
as if it's new, and  
no one has ever pried a world and its  
secrets from their grasp  
as if they've never had to flee  
before  
          tomorrow  
we have a date with destiny,  
my friend.  
So tonight  
I'll stand here in the shadows with  
my back against the wall  
watching you  
remembering  
sunlight on my skin and  
the smell of coffee  
before it became just one more reminder  
I don't need  
                  (black and viscous: bitter. Swirling in the cup as though to escape, would it but could. Dribbling  
                  over the rim and trailing thick across skin to pool in crevices at the join of wrist and hand;  
                  swallowing the light as you swallow it and who wants that, anyway?) So  
I'll lurk, and I'll listen, and I'll  
mourn the way you talk  
as if it were new

It's not. It's only here.


End file.
